CheekyMusician

If anyone else is needing an invite, I can sort you out with one. I've got 6 left right now, too.

Sometimes I feel the same about my club. I've been training for not long off 2 years and we spar A LOT at my club. At first this wasn't so bad, because I got taken out a lot to be taught basics 'cause I'd just started and when I got put in with the rest of the class I was just so busy trying to keep up that I didn't get bored. Now, though, sparring constantly can get boring. I often find myself going to class, doing the warm up, sparring for 10 minutes, sitting out for 10, sparring for 10, then attempting to spar for another 10 minutes but ending up just blethering to my sparring partner, which is a bad habit, I know, but its hard when you know you've got to spar for an hour and 15 minutes. You just can't be bothered with doing the same thing for that length of time almost every time you train. Either speak to your instructor or check some other clubs out round about and see if any of them appeal to you.

Hiya! *practices a karate kick in preparation for class*

I don't know if anyone can remember me, but I've been missing in action for a few months. Thanks to PacificShore's email, I remembered I really should get back to this place and back to karate (after an absence since mid-November due to Uni work and other commitments). So 'hi' to everyone (again). I'm going back to karate tomorrow, no excuses!

I'm a musician, too, and when I started martial arts that was pretty much my only real concern as well. I don't play professionally, though, although I would like to be an orchestral trumpeter one day (but I don't need particularly perfect fingers for that, so I guess I can risk a bit more than you there ) Still, music is very important to me, and I wouldn't want to have to give up any of the instruments I play because of an injury. I reckon its more the club than the art that matters. I mean, some TKD clubs could do breaking, and could focus quite a lot on handwork while some karate clubs might hardly work the hands at all. I chose karate in the end, although I was swithering between that and TKD. I must say, I've never looked bad. I'm so glad I chose karate. There has been (in the year and a half I've trained) 3 finger injuries at my club as far as I'm aware of. Two of them were breaks, but it was kids involved, so they can be a bit careless and clumsy I suppose. Then again, my club is very sparring orientated. We spar for at least an hour most training sessions, so I guess injuries are likely to crop up. Like others have said, I'm sure a teacher would understand if you wanted to wear extra hand protection. Good luck.

I'm a Shotokan girl and I did Aikido for a few weeks....I LOVED it! I quit because the guy who ran the club was a bit of a neo-Nazi and I didn't feel too comfortable with bowing to 'shrines' of O'Sensei (I'm a Christian), but I really liked the art, so good luck with it It would probably be best if you could find a club that wasn't run by a friend, but since you can't, you may as well try it out and see how it goes.

I don't finish up until the 19th, so plenty of time for handing in essays unfortunately. Well, my bus driver probably isn't young and good-looking in most people's eyes either! Eek! lol. He's about late 30s/early 40s, is kind of balding and kind of speaks funny.....but I don't care!!! I think he's the best looking man on the planet anyway. *ahem* Well, yeah, so anyway, I don't just go for any random bus driver like your friend, so I guess that's a relief. *sigh* I've not laid eyes on the bus driver for 3 days now! I'm beginning to suffer withdrawal symptoms! Gee, I'm so sad! lol

Were you talking to me or monkeygirl there? I'll just take it that you were talking to me I'm keeping pretty much on top of the work, although I've got an essay due for next Friday that I haven't even started yet and I'm beginning to get into a blind panic over it! Unfortunately I've not managed to bag myself any nice guys yet, although I do get to eye up my gorgeous bus driver and a rather tasty security guard who works in one of the Uni buildings! Heehee. I really hope you aren't stalking me!! *looks around for rugged manly man Russell Crowe to protect her* <---see how I cleverly got back on topic there! lol

Heck yeah! Russell Crowe is untolerably sexy! I defy any woman to watch Gladiator and honestly say that by the time it's over she's not fell even the tiniest bit in love with Russell Crowe. Heavens knows, I never found him a particularly attractive man until I seen Gladiator, and now I drool over him on a daily basis. Yes, I suppose I do have too much time on my hands. *sigh* Tom Cruise has never really been my type. He's not bad, and I can certainly see what other people see in him, but when it comes to movie stars it's Russell Crowe and Ralph Fiennes all the way for me! Not that I would turn down Hugh Grant, Ewan MacGregor, David Duchovny, Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Johnny Depp....etc.etc.etc. Heehee. *tries to pat away her devil horns* I can't help being a hormonal teenage girl. *sigh* Russell Crowe?? BLEEEEECHHH!!! Sorry, I don't think he's good-looking. Tom Cruise...looked pretty good in Minority Report, but often ends up looking pretty slimy. Now, Pierce Brosnan is an attractive man. I may be a teenager, but I can still appreciate the suaveness and hotness of James Bond. I don't have a thing for older guys or anything, though...I prefer Orlando Bloom/Freddie Prinze Jr. [/girliness] Well if you don't appreciate the rugged good looks of Russell Crowe then I suppose that that just means there's less competition for me if he ever leaves his wife and just happens to end up in Scotland looking for a substantially younger woman!

Heck yeah! Russell Crowe is untolerably sexy! I defy any woman to watch Gladiator and honestly say that by the time it's over she's not fell even the tiniest bit in love with Russell Crowe. Heavens knows, I never found him a particularly attractive man until I seen Gladiator, and now I drool over him on a daily basis. Yes, I suppose I do have too much time on my hands. *sigh* Tom Cruise has never really been my type. He's not bad, and I can certainly see what other people see in him, but when it comes to movie stars it's Russell Crowe and Ralph Fiennes all the way for me! Not that I would turn down Hugh Grant, Ewan MacGregor, David Duchovny, Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Johnny Depp....etc.etc.etc. Heehee. *tries to pat away her devil horns* I can't help being a hormonal teenage girl. *sigh*

Pray tell! At least PM me with it, you've got me interested now!!

Ugh! The man's an *! Shame on you. Did you hear his interview with Jo Wiley on Radio One? What a wally. I've heard the guy's an *, but since I've never met him personally, I'm not in a position to say, but he is an awfully good looking, ruggedly handsome, manly-man. If only all men looked like him. *sigh* Actually, my bus driver does! You have no idea how big a crush I have on my bus driver, but can you blame me with him being such a Russell Crowe lookalike?! *sigh* I never heard his interview...what did he say on it?

What's there NOT to like about Russell Crowe?! lol

Loved this movie and I highly recommend it to all my fellow forumites if you haven't seen it already.

My club doesn't pray or meditate in classes, but I would give anyone who did pray before their class a pat on the back. I think that, especially in America, every religion is given a relative amount of freedom to express their beliefs apart from Christians, and I think if your religion is a big part of your life and you want to express it in your classes then you should be free to.

http://images.quizilla.com/T/truly-dippy/1061401756_topdreams2.jpg Morpheus http://quizilla.com/users/truly-dippy/quizzes/%3F%3F%20Which%20Of%20The%20Greek%20Gods%20Are%20You%20%3F%3F/ brought to you by: http://quizilla.com

Kata, like everything, is always presenting new ways of thinking, new applications etc. so to be philosophical no one will ever really "know" a kata, but if we're going to use that train of thought, then no one will ever really "know" anything. No musician will ever "know" a piece of music, no movie critic will ever "know" a movie...there will always be new discoveries to be made. Personally, I think you can be considered to "know" a kata if you know all the movements and know applications for most of the movements, at least. Anything after that simply becomes knowing a kata very well, knowing it extremely well etc. As for me, right now I've only really tackled the 5 Heians. I've tried some more advanced katas and found myself just a tad confused, but I hate Heian Nidan for some reason. The other Heians don't really bother me, but Heian Nidan is EVIL!!

Blitz sells them. Its a UK company. I can't remember their address, but I think its something like Blitzsport.co.uk or something similar. Also try Playwell.com.

I've been in karate for a year so far and I'm still loving it, but who can say what will happen in the future? I certainly don't intend giving it up, unless I absolutely have to because of health problems or whatever, but I don't know what will happen that might make me quit. I've just started Uni, and I'm already finding that that's getting in the way. I finish at 4pm on my karate night, then have to catch the underground, then a bus home, then walk home from the bus stop, so I usually get in the house for about 6pm. I have to be up at 6am to get in for 9am lectures, so by the time I get home I'm generally tired, cranky and hungry. I have to quickly eat some dinner, get changed and I leave the house at 7pm to get to karate. It'll be worse when the uni starts piling the work on, too, so who knows what might happen to my karate? Its really the only thing that I can drop from my weekly activities, so I might find myself having to, although I certainly hope not.

I'd definately let the police know about this. If you're being honest that no one should know this information, then whoever it is that's IMing you must be pretty obsessive to have found it out. File a report with the police. They may not do anything right now, but at least if you've filed a report they'll know that this has been going on for a while if this person takes things to another level.

Time problems for me, too. School never used to get in the way much, but now I've started Uni, that'll probably start to cause some problems with my karate training, considering that I have to wake up at 6am, leave the house at 10 to 7, walk for 30 minutes to get to the bus stop, go on a bus for 40 minutes, get the underground, spend the day at Uni and get the bus back. Arrive back in my town for about 5pm or 5:30pm, then another 30 minute walk home. Not to mention reading specified texts, doing essays etc. That probably wont get in the way too much, though, just like school didn't when I was there, but the thing that is difficult when it comes to my training is other commitments that I have. I have piano lessons on a Monday which means I have to miss karate class. I've been playing the piano for 12 years, and studying karate for 1, so quitting piano isn't really an option. Tuesday night I help my mum run a youth group where we teach kids guitar. I don't really like teaching, but feel obliged to support my mum. I generally have a Wednesday night to "myself" (usually spent catching up on school work, piano, guitar and trumpet practice etc.), go to karate on a Thursday, have a Friday night to "myself", work all day on Saturday and on Sunday I teach a Bible class. Preparing lessons for the Bible class is the real killer. It seems to take up so much of my time because they're 16 year olds, so you can imagine how hard it is to keep them even remotely interested. I'm planning on starting to attend another karate club or two in the town where my Uni is, but that would mean that I would risk falling behind with my music and my uni work, so I'll wait and see how things go for now.

Heehee Did it happen in class? Something like that happened to me when I'd just started karate and was still a wee bit shy and nervous. It was a simple enough roundhouse kick I was trying to do but somehow went up in the air and landed with a thump. The only thing that was hurt was my pride, but it made it worse that everyone kept hopping about me for the next wee while saying, "Are you OK? Are you sure?" Eek! *goes red just thinking about it*

Uh...no.

Bow in. 5 minutes of jogging etc. 5 minutes of stretches 70 minutes of free-sparring 10 minutes of cool down and stretching Bow out. That's a pretty average class, we hardly ever do kata

@Bart. I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one that manages to throw myself to the ground occassionally when I try to do a kick! Thankfully, my ankle feels much better today. Its still a wee bit painful to walk on, but its a vast improvement from yesterday, so I'll hopefully be back at training next week. Training with my dad is going good. I use my kick shield all the time now, I hardly ever use my focus pads for training anymore, and my kicks are steadily improving. In fact, the other day my dad and I were practicing in the living room and he kept complaining that my kicks weren't hard enough, that they were lacking in power etc. I was getting really annoyed with his complaints by the time we got to practicing side thrust kicks, and when I kicked the shield I pushed him so far back he actually landed on the sofa behind us, flipped over backwards and almost went over the back of the sofa! I was quite suprised by that, and I think so was he 'cause he hasn't complained about my kicks being too weak since!